Press Release - April 21, 2016

Thousands Volunteer for Earth Day

Event Honors Earth Day by Beautifying 27 State Parks

Earth Day volunteers hunt for debris at Sonoma Coast State Park as part of California State Park Foundation's annual Earth Day celebration, April 16, 2016, in Jenner, Calif. Photo by Darryl Bush, courtesy of California State Parks Foundation.

California State Parks Foundation (CSPF)’s 18th Annual Earth Day Restoration & Cleanup, presented by Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E), mobilized over 2,000 volunteers to participate in environmental improvement projects at 27 state parks on Saturday, April 16. At locales as diverse as rural Mendocino and Tulare Counties to urban Los Angeles and San Francisco, volunteers removed invasive weeds and graffiti, installed picnic benches and displays, built food storage lockers, installed drip irrigation systems, painted work sheds and bathrooms, picked up trash along shorelines and lakes, planted native shrubs and bushes, repaired community garden boxes, and more. With continued budget restrictions at state parks, these thousands of contributed volunteer hours helped complete projects prior to the busy summer season as well as keep parks clean and safe for all to enjoy.

Since its inception in 1998, CSPF’s Earth Day Restoration and Cleanup program has resulted in 81,670 participants contributing more than 334,300 volunteer hours, worth nearly $6.39 million in park maintenance and improvements. Additionally, nearly $5 million has been raised to support the Earth Day program. Sponsors this year include PG&E, SUBWAY Restaurants, Edison International, Oracle, Goldman Sachs, Southern California Gas Company, The Nature Conservancy and Microsoft. In-kind sponsors include Peet's Coffee, Nature's Path, Lundberg Family Farms and Chipotle Mexican Grill.

Please update your browser.

Our website does not support your browser because it is out of date.
Please update to a newer version of Internet Explorer (IE 8 or higher) here.
Check your version here.
If you have a Internet Explorer 9 or newer and you are still receiving this message.
You may be have COMPATIBILITY VIEW enabled, read about that here to fix.Or, for the best web experience, we recommend using Chrome, Firefox or Safari.